


Many Happy Returns

by catystorm (trismegistus)



Series: Kansaki Sou [51]
Category: Fullmetal Alchemist, Multi-Fandom, Rurouni Kenshin
Genre: Crack Treated Seriously, Crossover Pairings, Dragging crack into regular continuity, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-28
Updated: 2014-08-28
Packaged: 2018-02-15 03:33:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,870
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2214246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trismegistus/pseuds/catystorm
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ed finally makes it home.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Many Happy Returns

Edward stumbled and fell to one knee, sliding in the slick created by blood and chalk. The blood was thick on the floor, coagulating quickly, obscuring the chalk lines that were etched carefully into the concrete. Edward put his flesh hand down without thinking, bracing himself so he didn’t slip further, the bile already rising in his throat.

It had all happened so fast. He had had no time to process it, the adrenaline was shot through his veins and he was trembling and all he could taste was smoke and blood – and now bile, as he vomited the remains of a meal eaten too long ago to properly remember. His automail arm was clasped tightly over his gut, and Edward coughed again, spewing the last of his breakfast onto the floor.

The Gate was never a pleasant experience. It was never  _meant_  to be experienced, not by mortal men or even alchemists, its existence as the funnel between worlds, a siphon of energy and a bastion of all the world’s “Truth” was a secret revealed only to those who dared trespass upon the realm of God. Most, if they were lucky, only saw it once – the punishment for an inerasable sin – but oh no, not him. Edward Elric had to be fucking special, he had to push the limits of alchemy in every direction. He had seen the Gate more than most – and had done the impossible, passing through its doors on multiple occasions.

This time, though – it would be the last.

He sat back on his heels and swiped his hand over his mouth, gagging slightly. The smoke had started to clear – the room stank of death and blood, sickly sweet and noxious. He had landed smack in the midst of someone’s foolish attempt at human transmutation, at human  _resurrection_  – and they were going to get one hell of a shocker, if they had survived this foolishness.

(The amount of blood on the floor seemed to speak otherwise.)

It was only then that he remembered, through the haze and disorientation – how he had gotten here, the Lazarus Pit, the fighting, his friends – and his stomach twisted violently with a different sort of spasm. How could he have  _forgotten -_

“Kenshin!” Edward’s voice was hoarse and ragged, in the clamor of battle he had screamed himself raw. His automail was still formed into a blade, lethally sharp, and he didn’t dare transmute it back again. “Kenshin!”

It was stupid of him, utterly selfish and foolish to have asked that of Kenshin. There were no guarantees that he would have made it safely through the Gate with Edward, and what sort of toll had it taken from him? Edward tried getting to his feet, stumbled further and somehow gained his balance, as unsteady as a newborn foal. The room was dark, even with the smoke from the deadly transmutation mostly clear, and Edward ran his hand before his eyes to be certain that nothing else had been taken from him in exchange for his unmolested passage. In the dim light he saw a form slumped over, at the edge of the transmutation circle where the blood had not reached. Edward staggered to the form, the alchemist, a sinner not unlike himself – but fate did not smile upon this one. He didn’t have to turn the body over to know the alchemist was dead.

But where was Kenshin?

He turned and surveyed the rest of the room. It was a large transmutation circle – chalked in a basement with no natural light, heavy metal shelves full of papers and beakers had been shoved haphazardly out of the way in order to make room for the transmutation. There was a large lump in the center of the circle, not far from where Edward had woken, but it, like the alchemist who had created it, was motionless. It had come into the world stillborn.

_What if it wasn’t enough, the transmutation wasn’t enough to bring them both through?_

_What if Kenshin was still at the Gate?_

Edward was already sick to his stomach, the thoughts spinning around his head did not make things any better. He pressed his left hand to his face, streaking the creature’s blood across his temple, and the low light coming from the top of the staircase caught the silver ring he wore still on his hand. He looked at it a moment, made a fist and pressed it to his mouth. He couldn’t give up, not yet – it was dark in here, he might be missing something – and even if Kenshin wasn’t here, it wasn’t like he didn’t know how to get to him.

_But the price…_

“Kenshin!” His voice was shrill now, the ragged edge having been stripped with the panic that threatened to overwhelm him. He staggered back on to the transmutation circle, mindful of where he stepped, his boots squishing in the coagulated mess. “Kenshin!”

This time, he was rewarded with a groan. It came from the other side of the monster, and Edward nearly tripped over a limb that wasn’t attached to the main body and he spun himself around it. “Kenshin!”

He was sprawled on his back, his head almost touching the creature at the center of the transmutation. He had his sword still, sheathed, held tight in one hand, the other arm thrown over his face. He was breathing hard and raggedly, his clothes stained with the blood on the floor. “Oh hell,” Edward said, dropping to his knees beside Kenshin. “Kenshin, are you – fuck, are you all right-”

He did not lift his arm. “Six years,” Kenshin’s voice sounded worse than Edward’s. “Six years, and I think you’ve called my name more in the last five minutes than in six fucking  _years-_ ”

Edward ran his left hand through his hair and laughed in sheer relief. “Your flair for the melodramatic really takes the edge off,” he scolded, and shoved at Kenshin’s right arm, which was still draped over his face. “Do you think you can stand? I want to get out of this bloody mess, literally.”

Kenshin lifted his arm, finally, and Edward was relieved to see his eyes were clear and normal. He had taken stock, four limbs and now head, everything seemed to be whole and in one piece. He had never had anything taken from him as recompense for passing  _through_  the Gate – the Truth was not involved in those transactions, the Gate functioned as a literal passage therein – but there was a first time for everything, especially when it came to screwing people by the surname of “Elric.” “Do you feel all right? Whole? You’re not missing any bits, right?”

Kenshin sat up, his hair dripping with the blood he had been lying in. “Aside from the fact I feel like I’ve been dragged six blocks under a city bus, not too badly.” He glanced at the monstrosity behind him and blanched only for a second. “What is  _that_ , where are we-?”

“Home, I think,” Edward said. “At least, only someone back home would be so foolish as to try to play God.” He got to his feet carefully, and held out his hand to Kenshin. “We need to find out if this poor fuck lived alone, because if not someone’s going to come home to this horrible discovery.”

“Should we try to clean it up?” Kenshin held his sword tightly in his right hand, but his left found Edward’s shoulder, something solid and strong for him to prop himself up on. “We can’t leave him here like this.”

“No worries,” Edward said as they made their way to the stairs. “I’ve got a friend who can help.”

* * *

It was impressive, the backlog of work that seemed to accumulate whenever his usual crew was out of the office. General Roy Mustang sighed, staring out the open door of his office to see the intern seated at Riza’s desk. She was out of the office for the rest of the month, administrative leave was the reason on file, but Roy had his suspicions that it had to do with some of the higher-level members of Intelligence courting her, trying to woo her from his garrison. Riza was generally open about these sorts of things to him, so her suddenly going on leave – without prior notice to anyone, especially one of her closest compatriots and commanding officer – was worrying at him.

One of the benefits to being a General though, meant that the person sitting at Riza’s desk currently was screening his calls. The phone had been ringing constantly all day, and it was annoying as hell. Not like he was doing any work anyway, but – he really didn’t want to be talking to other Generals about politics and junior officers about various and sundry things.

The intern looked back at him, and then looked at the phone again. Roy sighed, he sensed the question coming as she rose and came to the door. “Sir?”

She had light auburn hair worn in a bob, a popular hairstyle that Roy really wasn’t too fond of. At least she wore the same secretarial version of the military uniform, it was disconcerting when there were people sitting at the desks not in that familiar shade of blue. “Yes, what is it?”

“I have -” she looked at the paper in her hand. “I’ve got someone on the line, and he won’t give me his name. He’s demanding to be put through to you.”

It wasn’t uncommon for riffraff to get through, even though the military telephone number was supposed to be unlisted. Roy merely raised an eyebrow at her, it was her job to screen calls, not bring every little thing to his attention. “And?”

“He said to give you a code, that you’d understand?” She looked down at her paper again. “Epsilon theta oh-one-seven? Does that mean anything to you?”

_It couldn’t be._

Roy took a deep breath. “I think you need to put that one through,” he said, marveling internally at how level he was keeping his voice. She nodded, and turned back to her own desk.

He waited for the phone to ring once, and then picked up the receiver. Maybe this was just another clever fraud – there had been many in seven years, and a lot of them did their research. This was the first one with the code, though, so maybe, just  _maybe -_  “This is Mustang.”

“ _General_  Mustang?” The voice on the other end of the line was hauntingly familiar – aged a bit, slightly deeper than he remembered but there was no doubt in his mind in the slightest. “I thought you’d be ruling the country by now. You’ve been slacking off without me around, Mustang.”

Roy pressed two fingers to his eyepatch, and closed his one good eye. “Fullmetal,” he said, the title rolling off his tongue like it was just yesterday. “Your report is quite overdue. I hope you realize the position you’ve put me in.”

“You’ll get over it.” His voice was cheerful. “And while you’re getting over it, I could use a favor or three, if you’re feeling generous.” 

“I may be so inclined,” Roy said, and pulled his pen from the inkwell. “Welcome back, Fullmetal.”


End file.
